And while Mrs. Fisher listened, she felt thankful that she had been able to befriend the homeless boy. Benny was winning his way to her motherly heart in a wonderful manner, and was helping to fill the gap caused by the death of little Rob. And could she have had her own way, she would have adopted him as her own, and sent him to school when he was strong enough, with Harry and George. But Benny's independent spirit would not hear of it. He would stay at Scout Farm if he might be permitted to earn his own living; but if they could not find employment for him he must go out into the great world once more, and try over again to earn, by some means, his daily bread. So it was settled at length that he should stay, and learn to be a farmer; and then Benny grew strong rapidly, and ere the sunny September days passed away, he was out in the breezy fields helping to gather in the late harvest, and trying to make himself useful in every possible way. He was willing, nay, anxious to learn, and the work was by no means difficult. For the first few weeks he was very tired when evening came, but the fresh air gave him an appetite, and the work developed his muscles, and life once more became to him a joy.

He very soon got to know what to do without being told. He would tie up the cattle in the evening as if he had been used to a farm all his life; groom the horses as if he and they were old acquaintances; and feed the calves with all the dispatch of an old hand at the work. Mr. Fisher was delighted with him; "a handier little chap," he declared, "he had never come across." And instead of being in the way, as Mrs. Fisher feared he would be, he soon made himself necessary to them.

When winter came, with its long dreary evenings, he found a new source of pleasure, and that was a night school. It was Mrs. Fisher—to whom he had spoken of his thirst for knowledge—that persuaded him to attend. She knew he would not only derive pleasure, but profit. Benny was considerably puzzled at first as to what a "night school" was like; but he soon discovered its purpose, and night after night, through wind and rain, he plodded along the dark country lane to the neighbouring village of Scoutleigh, eager to improve his mind and add to his small store of knowledge. Never had a village schoolmaster a more diligent pupil than he, and rarely one that improved more rapidly.